by Audrey | Mar 24, 2025 | Charlottesville, Harrisonburg Architect, Interior Design
Cover Photo: Elise Trissel | Contractor: Trost Custom Homes
By Jarod Sankar
What really makes a home custom? Whether it’s building from the ground up, or renovating something existing, a custom home is a space crafted for you and your family’s needs. Just like a well-tailored suit, or a shoe that fits just right, having a space that not only meets your aesthetic preferences, but also meets your functional needs, is a wonderful feeling.
One of the most important places in any home is the kitchen. When crafting a custom kitchen, things like storage, seating, appliances, lighting, and flow are what can make or break a functional space. Here are some important questions and considerations you should talk through with your designer, and some helpful ideas on how to make your existing space more functional.
1) What kind of cabinetry do I want?
Cabinetry is one of the biggest components that make up a kitchen. Cabinets come in all shapes and sizes, and it’s important to know the difference. Cabinets are usually broken into three categories, which is off-the-shelf, semi-custom, and fully custom. Budget is usually what dictates which direction to go. Off-the-shelf cabinetry always comes in standard widths, depths, and layouts. You can still make an extremely functional space with these cabinets, but it’s important to talk with your designer about how you use your kitchen and how to maximize your storage. Semi-custom cabinetry has much more wiggle room, as you can adjust the depths, layouts, and features much more easily. With semi-custom cabinetry, it is easier to do things like larger than standard sink widths, appliance garages, built-in trash cans and cutting boards, etc. Full custom cabinetry is just as it sounds and is built by hand to meet exactly what you are looking for. This is the best choice for creating a fully custom kitchen, but it is also the most expensive. Semi-custom and fully custom also offer much more flexibility in terms of design, such as colors, wood species, stains, door styles, hardware, and all other cabinetry accessories. We specify kitchen cabinetry based on what is best suited for the client, and meets functionality, aesthetics, and budget restrictions.
2) What appliances do I need?
There are many more appliances on the market than just the typical refrigerator, stove, and microwave. Are you a minimalist who hates having appliances on the countertop? Are you someone who loves morning coffee but gets tired of refilling the water reservoir on your coffee maker? There are a ton of options for modern-day appliances that can end up making your day so much easier, and having an intuitive and custom kitchen involves thinking through exactly what you need, and what you don’t need. Along with thinking through what specialty appliances you could benefit from, there are also design implications that can be influenced by your lifestyle. For example, drawer microwaves and raised dishwashers could have much more ease of use, and promote aging in place.
3) What kind of lighting does my kitchen need?
Lighting is broken down into 4 segments:
- Task
- General
- Ambient
- Decorative
While there can be crossover between segments, kitchens need all four types of lighting to be the most functional. When designing a custom kitchen, think about how lighting plays a role in what you use your kitchen for. Task lighting includes under cabinet lighting, pendant lighting over your island or sink, and any other type of light that illuminates a specific area for work. General lighting is your room illumination, including recessed cans or flush mounts throughout the space that light up surfaces and walking paths. Ambient lighting can be similar to task lighting, as it highlights a specific area, or adds a general ambient feel to the space. This may be just adding a lamp to the kitchen counter for some warmth or leaving your light above the range on at night as a night light. Decorative lighting can be a specialty or be an aspect of the other three types. While pendants over the island may serve as task lighting, they can also be decorative to play into the aesthetic of the space.
This is just a start to figuring out how to make your custom kitchen truly custom, by best fitting your needs and working with your kitchen activities, not against. By thinking through these questions and answering them honestly, you’ll be able to give your designer great information on how to best design a space tailored to you.
Click here to learn more about countertop options
Click here to learn more about planning a kitchen renovation
Click here to learn more about why you should hire an interior designer
by Audrey | Mar 6, 2025 | Charlottesville, Harrisonburg Architect, Office Culture
How can Revit be used to save money and create a better design solution?
By: Emily Scognamillo
Autodesk Revit is a building information modeling software for architects, an all-in-one software platform that combines all necessary attributes to streamline the architectural process.
You might wonder “What’s the difference between AutoCAD and Revit?” Revit is a 3D modeling tool, while AutoCAD is a 2D drafting tool. The main benefits of using Revit is the collaboration aspect. While most platforms only allow one person to work on a project at a time, Revit has cloud work-sharing. This allows real-time collaboration among team members without necessarily being in the same office. On Revit, the user creates a model and from there it is very easy to get the necessary sections, elevations, and details that the project calls for.
The platform contains rendering capabilities, the option to format documents for permit readiness, and multiple other aspects that shorten the overall time needed on a project.
Revit also has a very large online presence so if a project calls for a certain product, it is very easy to incorporate that into the overall design.
Revit can even provide extra capabilities like energy analysis or can be used for qualities and cost estimating. Having everything on one platform improves accuracy and efficiency.
Overall, Revit might cost upfront but will save the company, the designer, and the client in the long run.
by Audrey | Mar 4, 2025 | Harrisonburg Architect, Interior Design
Photo by Brandy Somers Photography
How does a completed selection list prior to construction help the project budget?
By Jarod Sankar
When building a custom home, or renovating an existing space, there are many little details that all need to fit together, just like a puzzle. As most puzzles tend to be, missing even one tiny piece will distract from the entirety of what’s around it and make it look incomplete. No one likes an incomplete puzzle, and even more so, no one likes an incomplete house.
With this in mind, our firm is dedicated to providing you with a complete, thought-through, and well-designed set of drawings. To aid in this process, we provide our clients with a selection spreadsheet. This spreadsheet houses all the interior selections from the ground up. Having these selections prior to construction is a critical aspect in ensuring that a project remains on budget and avoids any unwanted change orders.
We work with some spectacular builders, but none of them are mind-readers. It’s important to remember that your builder won’t be able to accurately price a job without knowing the full scope. Just like you wouldn’t want your builder to start work from unfinished plans, the same is true for unfinished selections. While it may seem like you can pick things out during the construction process, most things need to be thought through beforehand, so that there are no unexpected issues with the selection. Material costs, labor costs, and timeline can all be affected by one specific selection. If any of these things change during construction, you end up responsible for paying for a change order.
To mitigate these potential problems, our goal is to provide your builder with a full detailed list of all the selections that make up your new home or renovation. Knowing what size and material of tile that you’re using, what window casing you desire, what front door you like, and all the other considerations are things that can drastically increase or decrease the overall price that comes from your builder. When a selection choice comes in over budget, it is much easier to adjust and rethink the selection before construction starts, not after.
Putting together a puzzle with missing pieces may be possible, but it doesn’t end up pretty. Let us help you complete the puzzle and work with you throughout the pre-design, design, and construction phases of your project.
by Charles Hendricks | Jan 17, 2025 | architecture, Charlottesville, community, Harrisonburg Architect, Local Leaders, team
We are thrilled to hear that once again we are the top rated Architectural firm in Virginia according to Top Rated Social. This recognition is based on online reviews posted to Google by our clients. Our rating of 95 reflects 25 Five Star reviews.
We have been fortunate to achieve the following recognitions:
2025 – Top Rated Local Architects in Virginia #1
2024 – Top Rated Local Architects in Virginia #1
2023 – Top Rated Local Architects in Virginia #1
2022 – Top Rated Local Architects in Virginia #2
2021 – Top Rated Local Architects in Virginia #4
2020 – Top Rated Local Architects in Virginia #1
2019 – Top Rated Local Architects in Virginia #2
Thank you so much to our clients that have taken the time to post an online review supporting our firm’s future success.
by Charles Hendricks | Jan 16, 2025 | architecture, Commercial Architect, Harrisonburg Architect, Interior Design, project update, School architect
Eastern Mennonite Elementary school is in the home stretch with finishes being installed. On my last visit the lights were being installed inside, the drywall was done, and the shape of the space was clear. I am looking forward to a return visit as the doors have been installed and I imagine the space is flooded with light. There is also a special stained glass installation happening in one of the three upper windows on the north side of the space. I have seen bits of this beautiful work being created by Zachery Nafzinger on his social media posts for ZN Stained Glass.
This space will serve as a place of gathering for the students of the Elementary school to come together and build community. This is a fundamental goal of our firm is to create spaces where this can happen. The idea of building a stronger community through design is what drives us to keep doing what we are doing.
The goal of this building and this space was to keep a connection to the outside, to make it adaptable for many uses, and to incorporate building science / sustainability. We have achieved each of those goals with the wide doors that can stay open in nice weather creating a pavilion like space. The space will be used for lunch, class gatherings, whole school functions, and even a recreation space for days when PE cannot be outside. The building science / sustainability strategies we have used throughout this project include air tight insulation, exterior continuous insulation, LED lights, and a simple form to reduce material use while making the building striking from the outside.
I cannot wait to see it finished and being used. I know the teachers will also welcome this added space for their daily functions.
by Charles Hendricks | Jan 5, 2025 | architecture, Harrisonburg Architect, Massanutten Resort, project update
Work on this new custom home at Massanutten Resort continues to uncover the design we planned for our clients. Working in the resort on the steep slopes takes some extra care to develop a design that looks like it belongs. There are many houses that clearly just got put on the site but our goal is to always integrate the design with the land. As Beck Builders continues to their work we will update you on the progress.
This modern style cottage has the large glass wall to capture views as well as a large wrap around deck and screen porch. It also blends into the landscape with earth tone colors and exposed wood overhangs. Blending in a rusted metal color and the warm wood over the backdrop of the dark siding makes it clear that this home has style.
Working with the grade on the site we were able to diminish the garage door from being a focal point of the home design. We also extended the driveway and planned a parking area on the home site so the owners can host lots of friends at their retreat. We cannot wait until the interior finishes get installed so we can see the final vision in real life.
Previous update here.
This space will serve as a place of gathering for the students of the Elementary school to come together and build community. This is a fundamental goal of our firm is to create spaces where this can happen. The idea of building a stronger community through design is what drives us to keep doing what we are doing.
